W.H., allies mock Pawlenty plan

Democrats in and outside the White House are homing in on Tim Pawlenty's call for 5 percent annual economic growth as a target for ridicule. Here's Bill Burton, the former White House spokesman who now leads the independent pro-Obama group Priorities USA, on "Morning Joe":

Do you think Goolsbee and Sperling are sitting around the White House like, ‘Oh, why hadn’t we thought of that? ... It’s not just pie in the sky. It’s a whole floating bakery.

With regards to 5 percent growth, we couldn’t agree more; that would be very beneficial to the economy. We think providing expansive tax cuts to the wealthy — which we did in the last term and added tremendously to our debt and resulted in this President inheriting a massive deficit and debt in 2009 — probably not the best approach.

The notion that Pawlenty's plan isn't serious hasn't taken hold on the right, where the Club for Growth, the Wall Street Journal and, now, Jack Welch, have come away impressed.